What Are You Playing: 9 Years since the Last Dragon Age

[Psyren]

I found Bramble very artistically appealing. However, the indie horror cliché of "small lonely child with a big head platforms through a scary world" is starting to grate on me a little. (See also Limbo, Inside, Little Nightmares, Ori, Song of the Deep etc etc.)

[ArmyOfOptimists]

Finished up Spider-Man 2. It's a damn good game - not that that's a surprise, given how good the first game and Miles Morales were, but still well worth saying. Gameplay remains as fun as it was in the previous games, and some of the new mobility stuff (the web wings, super jump/run) are very nice additions to a game series where mobility was already a highlight. Combat's largely same-y, especially if you played Miles Morales and already got to use his eletric special moves before, but still very good, and there are a few new additions. Side quests remain quite strong - a couple got a little repetitive (the EMF stuff in particular comes to mind), but for the most part each instance of each questline is individualized enough to keep them worth doing. Even collecting all of the Spider-Bots wound up being something I did the whole quest for; although the last couple of those were a pain to locate, really wish they'd have added them to your main map with that one upgrade, not just the mini-map.

Story-wise, nothing groundbreaking, but solid, kept me interested the whole way through.

Spoiler

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So the main plot is really the Venom one, not so much Kraven, who is mostly there to provide you a conflict up until the point where the symbiote becomes the problem. Still, Kraven himself worked fairly well as a villain, getting to see him hunting after other villains was a neat twist, the reveal about his family was as disturbing as I'm sure it was meant to be, and the big confrontation with him was very satisfying. And then he gets to be the guy who proves what a big threat Venom truly is after. Well-handled all around I'd say.

As for Venom himself, they did manage to have me wondering who it would be midway through the game. While Harry was the obvious pick since he had it initially and had been the one shown with it at the end of the first game, the fact that Norman had it before him had me thinking that Harry might die of his unnamed disease after giving the suit to Peter, and Norman would find out and blame Peter, later leading to the symbiote bonding with him, but no. Also I gave some consideration to it maybe ending up on Kraven, who at least physically fits Venom more and has his cancer that the symbiote could suppress, but not terribly surprised that didn't happen. Harry wound up working pretty well, though I'm surprised they kept him kind of alive at the end there. Similarly surprised that they did not tease the Venom symbiote surviving - I would figure that Venom as an anti-hero is too big a part of the character now for them not to include that in the next game now that they've done him as the main villain, but maybe they're genuinely not planning that.

I will say, the "Anti-Venom suit" thing does strike me as pretty silly. I had to look up whether that was something they made up for this game or not; and I'm not sure if it actually being something from the comics makes it better or worse. Though apparently the comic version was a symbiote itself, which it isn't in this one, it's just Peter getting all the powers with none of the drawbacks. I think that's my main problem with it, aside from the goofy name.

Also, despite the story clearly focusing more on Peter - mostly because this is first and foremost an adaptation of the symbiote suit/Venom storyline, after all - they did a pretty good job integrating Miles into it and making him feel like he belonged. Him saving Peter from the symbiote after the Kraven fight was great, his plotline with Martin Li/Mister Negative was quite good, got a near-equal role in the final boss fight with Venom, and he got more side-quests specific to him than Peter did to help make up for being in the secondary position in the main plot. Though granted I'm not clear on why the Mysteriums side-quest was Miles specific, but eh. Also, it was great seeing each Spider-Man interact with the other's supporting casts - Peter with Miles' mom and friends, Miles with Mary Jane and Harry.

And there's of course setup for the next game, which is interesting at points. Had to look up who that girl from Miles' post-credits scene was; apparently she's another spider-hero who gets bitten by that same radioactive spider, who goes by Silk? Odd choice of name, but with Peter entering a pseudo-retirement and letting Miles take the lead on spider-manning, I guess the idea is to introduce her as the newcomer to the Spider-squad next time and let Miles be her mentor, which could be neat. Not that I wouldn't expect Peter to be involved in the next game anyway, especially given the villains they've teased, but giving him a smaller role intentionally to focus more on the other spiders would probably be a good idea. Speaking of villains, what I can see they've got no less than three villains they've teased for the next game: Norman as the Green Goblin, the return of Doc Oc, and Carnage from that one side-quest. Not thrilled with that last honestly; Venom works fine as a villain to me, but Carnage is just Venom stripped of the interesting parts and made (more of) a psycho, IMO. No surprise Norman as the Goblin would be next after this game, but the return of Doc Oc is an unexpected possibility, leaves me wondering how they intend to handle that, given he was already the main villain of the first one. I guess just make him more of a supporting villain to Green Goblin's main villain, maybe, but hopefully that's not all there is to it.

So yeah, had a lot of fun with that. I'm actually strongly considering doing another run on a higher difficulty (did normal/"Amazing" for my first run), just because the game's not that long and I think I'd enjoy doing it again with a bit more challenge. The call of returning to my second BG3 run is also strong though. We'll see.

Spoiler

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The Venom symbiote can still come back since they established that being bonded to it deeply enough leaves "traces" of it in your system that can reemerge. Insomniac has said they've considered a Venom spin-off game, but I don't think it's in the works at the moment.

As far as Anti-Venom goes, it was always the powers without the drawbacks. The Anti-Venom symbiote in the comics is non-sentient. It doesn't talk or try to control the host at all. It's more like what Peter thought the symbiote was in this game: an organic bio-suit. The downside to Anti-Venom is that, as it's very focused on healing (something that doesn't really show up in this game), it can end up cancelling out Spider-man's powers because it will try to heal the radioactive spider out of him. The game took out a lot of symbiote weaknesses, though. Venom is usually weak to fire, but is shown surviving a blast furnace early on.

Agree that it's a great game, though. I was really surprised how well paced the side content was. It rarely felt like checking things off a list. By the time I was wondering "How many more of these are there?" it was close to the final task.

[Zevox]

Spoiler

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The Venom symbiote can still come back since they established that being bonded to it deeply enough leaves "traces" of it in your system that can reemerge. Insomniac has said they've considered a Venom spin-off game, but I don't think it's in the works at the moment.

As far as Anti-Venom goes, it was always the powers without the drawbacks. The Anti-Venom symbiote in the comics is non-sentient. It doesn't talk or try to control the host at all. It's more like what Peter thought the symbiote was in this game: an organic bio-suit. The downside to Anti-Venom is that, as it's very focused on healing (something that doesn't really show up in this game), it can end up cancelling out Spider-man's powers because it will try to heal the radioactive spider out of him. The game took out a lot of symbiote weaknesses, though. Venom is usually weak to fire, but is shown surviving a blast furnace early on.

Agree that it's a great game, though. I was really surprised how well paced the side content was. It rarely felt like checking things off a list. By the time I was wondering "How many more of these are there?" it was close to the final task.

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I suppose that's true. Just surprised they didn't straight-up tease Venom surviving, I suppose, I was fully expecting it, given how popular of a character he is. Spin-off game for Venom would also make sense though, they already did it for Miles, and they had him playable for that one segment here already.

And Anti-Venom being a symbiote didn't actually mean anything in the comics? Yeesh, okay, guess I just have that problem with the concept in general then. Thought I didn't think it was something Peter got in the comics from what I read, but rather Eddie Brock?

And yeah, pacing of the game is definitely spot-on, it never drags in any regard, main plot or side-quests, and also never feels rushed. Just very well handled there.

Minor annoyance though: no New Game+. So my new file can't carry over all those alternate costumes I unlocked but mostly didn't use - boo! Granted, I'm happy enough unlocking the gameplay stuff again rather than just being maxed out from the start, I am looking for some additional challenge this time, but I wanted to jump around those costumes throughout the game, and it takes a long while to get a lot of the good ones.

[Anonymouswizard]

IShe's honest but pretty damn vague. "Old things should be preserved" tells us nothing about what she was actually planning to do with it. (Not that it matters anyway, since she doesn't get to keep it no matter what.)

Yes she's vague, it's part of her being the first of the mage party members who's using the party to accomplish her goals. But that also means she's the one ho isn't actually being manipulative, her lack of social skills make the fact she's pretty much planning to hide it less clear.

Morrigan is very good at manipulating people she's very bad t being honest. This isn't the first time it can come up in the game.

[Rodin]

I'm more or less enjoying Lords of the Fallen. I do have to question why jumping is like this (answer, Dark Souls did it this way)? Why, given that jumping is like this, is there platforming (answer: Dark Souls did it, Dark Souls is perfect, therefore this must also do that. Amen.)? And really, how how the hell did nobody play this part, go "this sucks" and either get rid of the semi-precision platforming in a game with controls so tanky they make PS1 Lara Croft blush, or at least bind jump to one of the several basically unused face buttons? The Y button is right there, doing nothing. B is criminally underutilized as well. Just make jump a normal command!

I finally got around to picking up Lords of the Fallen, and now I see what you mean.

In general, I don't mind the Dark Souls jump. It's not my favorite implementation ever, but I still prefer it over Ocarina of Time's "run at a cliff edge and hope you auto-jump at the right angle" method. Elden Ring putting in a regular jump button is a straight up improvement, but I can manage with the older implementation.

As long as its done right.

Lies of P had a fiddly jump due to really crappy hitboxing. The "ground" was rarely where it appeared, making the various jumps in that game more difficult than they appeared because you needed to hit a much narrower area on the other side and the jump was also shorter than it appeared, meaning you had to wait until the literal last moment to make some of the jumps. Lies of P compensated for this by making the required jumps an absolute minimum - I think there's only abour 4-5 required jumps in the entire game, and several of them can be skipped by running over the platform before the ground breaks.

Lords of the Fallen...this game just takes the cake. Instead of making the dodge roll button the sprint button if you hold it down, they made it the left thumbstick. Ok, later Souls games had that as an option too so that's fine. Except you can't then press the thumbstick again to perform a jump. And you can't press the dodge button either. You have to press the interact button, which is an extra button press on a different hand from the one you're using to sprint. It also does absolutely nothing if you aren't sprinting, which means you have no clue if the input got read or not. With Dark Souls, at least a failed jump results in a roll, which is sometimes enough to clear the gap and if you did it early you might not fall off the edge.

And they put an extended jumping section with enemies trying to push you off ledges that early into the game? With these controls?

Honestly, I have been pretty unimpressed with Lords of the Fallen so far. I judged Lies of P harshly based on its graphics and the elements it stole from Bloodborne and called it a "B game". I don't think Lords of the Fallen reaches that high based on what I've seen so far, and that's without taking my later revision of Lies of P's score up to A/S tier. Lords of the Fallen is a C at best.

It's got one of the worst tutorials I've ever seen, hammering you with page after page of instructions that give you no time to learn the mechanics organically. These commands are often three or more parts long (Lock on with RS, then hold LT, then press RB, put your left foot in and shake it all about). After about 50 pages of instruction on how to use the lantern, it finally got around to telling me how to block. Thanks game, I got that one.

Graphically, the game is beautiful...but that beauty is used poorly. There's destructible objects everywhere. I'm constantly taking damage because there was an enemy I didn't see among piles of barrels or crates. Or because I can't see an incoming attack under all the shattered wood flying around the screen. Like Bloodborne, it's in love with scattering jagged bits of environment all over the place. I've bonked my weapon more in my first few hours than I did in my entire first playthrough of Lies of P. I've gotten stuck in crevices, unable to dodge out. At one point I got stuck inside the bosses hitbox!

And let's talk hitboxes. I can rarely tell what's going to hit me and what isn't. The first boss is one you're supposed to lose to...but I kept accidentally dodging his fire. I started my dodge animation after the fire hit me, but I was miraculously fine. Against the first real boss I got caught out a bunch because the floaty dodge trapped me in the animation and I got hit by the attack after the one I dodged. I've "parried" multiple times by just holding up my shield, or raising my shield after a blow connected. It's like the opposite of input lag.

The first real boss is bad design incarnate. The moveset is something from an endgame boss in other games - homing shockwaves, hitscan laser beam, AoE attacks that fill two-thirds of the arena, and an extendable sword that's at least 10 ft long with a dodgy hitbox. And yet you only have three potions to deal with this, and no way to upgrade your weapon. Level up you say? That's great and all, but unlike a Souls game you don't start at 600-700 souls to level up. You start at 2000. I managed to gain 2 levels before confronting the boss, and after grinding I managed to pick up 2 more. I typically level up 8-10 times before taking the first boss in a Souls game. Without grinding. The boss wouldn't be terrible as a mid-to-late game fight, but putting it here would be like Elden Ring starting players off against Mogh.

The combat alternates between floaty and incredibly stiff. The combo attacks you can dish out are neat, but their recovery is so bad that if you don't kill an enemy you're taking a guaranteed punish. Not doing combos sounds like a solution, except your damage is so poor without comboing that you'd be there all day. There eventually was a rythym I managed to get into against the first boss, but it didn't feel particularly good.

After only a few hours of play, the game has been dropped from my prime time gaming spot. It's play while watching the TV material.

[Rynjin]

I thought Pieta was an excellent first boss. She has very telegraphed melee attacks that are easy to perfect parry and leave her open to a visceral attack, and her special moves are also likewise very telegraphed and simple to dodge or avoid. only the grab attack is really kinda BS.

The issue with the game comes as you progress and it just becomes a never-ending deluge of more and more dudes and by the time I found myself sprinting through every new area without fighting anything because it's too easy to get bogged down I just decided not to play anymore and pick up my Dream of the Strong Nioh 2 playthrough instead.

[Anonymouswizard]

Making decent progress on my Kingmaker ranger run, killed the Stag Lord, became Baroness, and seduced a psychic via getting her a disk.

Honestly now we're a few months down the road I honestly think Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous might be slightly better than Baldur's Gate 3. Part of it is the party size, both in terms of available members and who you can have with you, allowing you to specialise some companions into more niche builds and just bringing more variety to the table, a little bit is it hitting the nostalgia targets a lot better, and honestly I think the 3.X ruleset is just better for a CRPG (I should really reget the 3.5 or Pathfinder core).

But yes, six girl parties are great. I can easily slot in two front liners (generally Valerie and Amri) and still be able to double up on dedicated archers or blasters if I want. There's also a lot less annoyance over Trickery just due to the fact that multiple characters spec into it by default.

It's making me even more excited for when Rogue Trader finally drops.

[Psyren]

Yes she's vague, it's part of her being the first of the mage party members who's using the party to accomplish her goals. But that also means she's the one ho isn't actually being manipulative, her lack of social skills make the fact she's pretty much planning to hide it less clear.

Morrigan is very good at manipulating people she's very bad t being honest. This isn't the first time it can come up in the game.

I mean, she was being manipulative though: "'tis cold in my tent, all alone!" I agree she was less problematic overall than the other apostates in the series, though.

[Anonymouswizard]

I mean, she was being manipulative though: "'tis cold in my tent, all alone!" I agree she was less problematic overall than the other apostates in the series, though.

Let me rephrase that: she's manipulative, except when she's enacting her plan. The couple of very basic steps she gets you to do are things she's honest about, if somewhat vague on her exact goals. She's not engaged in manipulation for a significant chunk of the game unlike some other characters I could mention.

She's more manipulative when trying to get you into bed, but Lelianna is similarly indirect. At least Alastair is willing to just straight up say 'hey, I've decided I want sex, is that okay with you'.

Actually I really like Alastairs conversations on the topic, he's direct about his feelings even when those are 'I'm unsure'.

[warty goblin]

I thought Pieta was an excellent first boss. She has very telegraphed melee attacks that are easy to perfect parry and leave her open to a visceral attack, and her special moves are also likewise very telegraphed and simple to dodge or avoid. only the grab attack is really kinda BS.

Yeah, I didn't super hate that boss, and having the summon dude helped a lot. I even pushed through the goddamn platforming bit.

What really wore me down was less the gameplay, which I was actually getting sorta decent at, so much just how empty and pointless and featureless it was. Leveling is both super necessary, just to keep up with the number treadmill, and very boring because it's just a number treadmill. There's no characters, no locations that aren't bombed out Gothic hellscapes, the world of the dead is a slightly creepier Gothic hellscape, you're a creepy Gothic weirdo pointlessly murdering the same creepy Gothic weirdos over and over. It isn't depressing, it lacks the spine and structure and meaning to be deliberately depressing beyond, like, vibes*. it's just bland, wasted potential.

*I don't like vibes as a substitute for structure, they're just a limp attempt to end run the hard part of writing something good and effective by hiring a competent art director.

[Sapphire Guard]

That was rhetorical speculation, folks. There's no need to jump in with detailed explanation including things from future games.

You must have missed a lot of content, I'm no completionist but my average playthroughs last about 120 hours. Also

Didn't do any DLC, if that makes a difference.

[Erloas]

Anyone else tried Cities Skylines 2 yet? I would have waited expect it's on GamePass so it was a free look.
I know the reviews have all talked about performance issues.
So far I haven't had any, but I haven't make a very large city yet.
Some things seem like good upgrades from the first, there are a few things that used to be DLC that are now just part of the game. A few things that they didn't have but used to be part of Sim City, like more outside connections.
I've had a few issues with trying to get things like power and sewer to connect, the snapping to existing lines in 3d space seems inconsistent.
The large buildings also do weird things to uneven ground,
I also tried a hydro plant, and I thought it said it would do 80mw but for a while it was only doing like 150kw and it eventually went to 5mw, which is just entirely useless, especially for the cost. It's just not clear how it's figured and how to improve it. The worst part there was that it flooded part of my city, but even after raising the ground level around the river I had water sitting in my city that just wouldn't go away.
There are some budget issues too, in that things don't seem to scale well to small cities. Bus for a small city has the majority of the cost for a huge system, making building into things like that early very hard. Shipping, trains, education, more advanced power, all seemed to do that.
Normal it would seem like dropping the budget on them would do that, but it doesn't seem to work like expected. If you're only using 10 out of 50 buses but set budget to 50% they don't use 25 busses well, the 10 you are using no one likes because you're cutting funding.
On the school in particular I had 18 of 200 students, but if I set the budget to 50% I had 100% drop out rate.
It basically makes it impossible to actually balance a budget, literally the only way I ever had money was the big bonus they give when you pass a milestone.

That all sounds just like everything is bad, but it's not. Overall things mostly seem good it's just the issues that stand out. There are probably some mechanics that just take some time to figure out.

[Errorname]

Let me rephrase that: she's manipulative, except when she's enacting her plan. The couple of very basic steps she gets you to do are things she's honest about, if somewhat vague on her exact goals. She's not engaged in manipulation for a significant chunk of the game unlike some other characters I could mention.

Spoiler: Future Game Spoilers

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She doesn't even come close to Anders, let alone Solas.

[Anonymouswizard]

Spoiler: Future Game Spoilers

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She doesn't even come close to Anders, let alone Solas.

Spoiler: DA2+Inquisition

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Yep, Anders is manipulating you for Act 3, whereas the entirety of Inquisition is Solas manipulating the Inquisitor and Cassandra into retailing his scheme, and by the end of Trespasser basically pulls it off without a hitch.

Morrigan gets away with it because her manipulation is mostly outside of the main plot. For Anders it works well if Hawke executes him for his actions, although as the only non-Hawke healer he's basically too damn useful to lose. However by Solas the entire game basically revolves around your mage's machinations and then he gets away scott free.

Plus Morrigan was built to be a powerful control mage and Anders the resident healer. Solas meanwhile isn't particularly special gameplay wise.

[warty goblin]

Won my Age of Wonder 4 game as the psychopathically evil rat. I turned all my people into demons, summoned demons, reaped souls, made undead, and took the evil option in pretty much every quest that game up. Good times. Well, not good times. Very bad times. Lots of screaming as souls were ripped out and forced into horrible constructs of bone and/or literal grim reapers.

I ended up going for a conquest victory, which felt by far the most natural. I had one ally, and then just killed everybody else. The last AI to fall was actually making a credible-ish go at winning, but just didn't have a good solution to me blitzing through his territory with a couple very major demons. There's a 140 turn limit on the game... and I won on turn 140, finally seizing the bastard's throne city. I had been planning to sack his cities on at a time, but there just wasn't enough time to plod through all of them, so I flat out charged through his territory to get there with exactly enough time to win.

Anyway, gonna put AoW 4 to bed until at least the next major patch in November.

[Psyren]

Spoiler: DA2+Inquisition

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Yep, Anders is manipulating you for Act 3, whereas the entirety of Inquisition is Solas manipulating the Inquisitor and Cassandra into retailing his scheme, and by the end of Trespasser basically pulls it off without a hitch.

Morrigan gets away with it because her manipulation is mostly outside of the main plot. For Anders it works well if Hawke executes him for his actions, although as the only non-Hawke healer he's basically too damn useful to lose. However by Solas the entire game basically revolves around your mage's machinations and then he gets away scott free.

Plus Morrigan was built to be a powerful control mage and Anders the resident healer. Solas meanwhile isn't particularly special gameplay wise.

I'd say "without a hitch" is a bit of an oversell, there was a pretty big hitch:

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Using the Inquisition to defeat Corypheus destroyed his Orb - forcing him to sacrifice FleMythal (or perhaps more accurately, she chose to sacrifice herself) as his backup plan. Presumably this has slowed his planned cosmic reboot substantially, since he originally believed that with the charged orb from the beginning of the game that he would have been able to tear down the veil and wipe out the current world instantly.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'd say "without a hitch" is a bit of an oversell, there was a pretty big hitch:

Spoiler

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Using the Inquisition to defeat Corypheus destroyed his Orb - forcing him to sacrifice FleMythal (or perhaps more accurately, she chose to sacrifice herself) as his backup plan. Presumably this has slowed his planned cosmic reboot substantially, since he originally believed that with the charged orb from the beginning of the game that he would have been able to tear down the veil and wipe out the current world instantly.

True, but they're still twenty one steps ahead of everybody else.


Anyway slipped over to WotR, playing a Chaotic Good Human Kineticist (Earth) probably going Azata. I should really go back to my Act 4 Angel run, but I'm just not feeling that. I was considering a Dark Elementalist to nab all the lore skills, but I remember their soul harvest being a pain as you had to cast it during combat. Using Visual Adjustments to swap my class outfit to something a bit more dress like, because no proper lady commands a war in trousers.

20 CON is going to be fun.

ETA: having a ton of trouble hitting, I pull up my character sheet, and apparently my blast is using Strength to attack instead of Dexterity? I dumped Strength because I was planning to throw rocks around instead of actually hitting anything, guess I'm restarting and going for either fire or cold blasts instead...

[ArmyOfOptimists]

True, but they're still twenty one steps ahead of everybody else.


Anyway slipped over to WotR, playing a Chaotic Good Human Kineticist (Earth) probably going Azata. I should really go back to my Act 4 Angel run, but I'm just not feeling that. I was considering a Dark Elementalist to nab all the lore skills, but I remember their soul harvest being a pain as you had to cast it during combat. Using Visual Adjustments to swap my class outfit to something a bit more dress like, because no proper lady commands a war in trousers.

20 CON is going to be fun.

ETA: having a ton of trouble hitting, I pull up my character sheet, and apparently my blast is using Strength to attack instead of Dexterity? I dumped Strength because I was planning to throw rocks around instead of actually hitting anything, guess I'm restarting and going for either fire or cold blasts instead...

That's odd. Kineticist blasts should use Dexterity if they're ranged and Strength if they're melee (i.e. Kinetic Blade). I'm not aware of any class feature that causes them to use Strength for their ranged attacks. If you didn't take Precise Shot, though, you'll suffer a nasty -4 penalty shooting at anything that another character is in melee with. Pumping to-hit isn't that necessary, though. Kineticists become somewhat ludicrous once they get Energy blasts since those target touch AC. You almost never miss once those come into play.

[GloatingSwine]

I've been replaying the Doom series. They pretty much never get old.

This time though I've also played through Doom 64 which I hadn't before. It feels like a Doom 3 for Doom 2, if you know what I mean. Rather than reinventing the series into a horror shooter like the actual Doom 3 (on the slate next along with Alan Wake 2 for spoopy week) it moves and feels like Doom and all the enemies and weapons have pretty much the same stats, and it does some cool new stuff with moving bits of level geometry.

It does have a slightly different level design ethos to the PC Dooms, more tight spaces and twisty corridors, fewer open areas with clear lines of sight, and it likes to put a lot of beef in. Whilst it doesn't have many big swarms of enemies like Doom 2 did they found the Baron of Hell and liked what they found and so encounters with 3-5 of them are not uncommon.

Also on the top difficulty level there are a couple of dual Cyberdemon fights, which even Doom 2 didn't dare to inflict, so enjoy that. (Respect to anyone who finished it on Watch Me Die on original hardware)

Overall I think I'd put it in between Doom 1 (still my favourite of the originals) and Doom 2. Doom 2 has a few more levels that put concept ahead of theme and feel like they should have belonged as secret or side levels (eg. Tricks and Traps and Barrels o' Fun).

[Sapphire Guard]

Contrary to my last post, I startede playing DA2. The first time I tried it, I played up to Kirkwall and stopped, so I just continued that save.

Spoiler: Various errands to fund expedition

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The writing is quite good. The dialogue options you are given are quite blunt, but Hawke usually actually says something much more diplomatic. The Hero of Ferelden is male, human and alive, I can't remember if I picked that or it just set the default, but either way, my casteless dwarf Paragon is lost to history.

Was surprised Athenril kept her word about a year's service. I'm not really sure why the Hawkes want to go on this random expedition in the first place. If you can come up with 50 gold sovereigns in a matter of weeks, get a nicer house instead. That's a lot of money, I could outfit a company of Arl Eamon's knights for that kind of cash. And they have been left the estate in the will, so what's the point? (If this is a future twist, kindly do not answer me)

I have circa 27 so far, minus 5 sovereigns for the refugees and sundry expenses, there seemed to be a weird glitch where I was picking up health potions off corpses but they weren't showing up in my inventory for a while.

In the least surprising twist imaginable, Flemeth left herself a back door.

Aveline is now a guard captain, Bethany is now my friend. The random muggers are annoying fights, because more people just keep materialising. The ones in hightown are especially strange, random gangs dressed as guardsmen just hang around on street corners attacking passers by. Probably shouldn't have involved Aveline in various shady dealings in lowtown, but it was on the way to the guardsman ambush, so I was too lazy to switch. Switched her out with Fenris once she got promoted, so now there are lots of arguments with Anders and Bethany over which of them are more oppressed. I would use Merrill more, but she can't heal.

Anders and Isabela's quests both required leaving giant piles of corpses in the Chantry overnight, so whoever does the cleaning there is in for a surprise.

Edit: I'm hoping the mystery missing templars are the ones I killed in the chantry on Ander's quest, but that seems unlikely.

[Anonymouswizard]

That's odd. Kineticist blasts should use Dexterity if they're ranged and Strength if they're melee (i.e. Kinetic Blade). I'm not aware of any class feature that causes them to use Strength for their ranged attacks. If you didn't take Precise Shot, though, you'll suffer a nasty -4 penalty shooting at anything that another character is in melee with. Pumping to-hit isn't that necessary, though. Kineticists become somewhat ludicrous once they get Energy blasts since those target touch AC. You almost never miss once those come into play.

I dunno, I burned a feat on Weapon Finesse when I restarted and that solved about 80% of my to-hit issues. I'll be picking up Precise Shot at level 3, but I always pump Persuasion early to get those conversation options working (which is why my first Wild Talent went on a snake).

[Whoracle]

Currently playing Alan Wake II. About 14 hours in, maybe two thirds done. Good game, maybe bordering on great. Interesting world building, good atmosphere. One bug that gets to me: I returned to an area to gather collectibles, and the lighting is glitches. Can't see anything. Will see if it changes in the plot mandated return trip.

The new protagonist Saga is the weakest point so far. Not bad, not good, just in the upper positive border of bland. Maybe she gets better during the remainder.

Overall: would strongly recommend if you liked Alan Wake and/or Control. If you are ambivalent then it's still fun and a less strong recommend. If you dislike those keep off - it's very much "more of the same", mostly, and the actual gameplay is no standout that'd let you forget the rest.

[Spore]

Started PS4's Marvel's Spider-Man yesterday due to the Steam Discount, since Part 2 was released and I finally have a computer that can play the first one. Mechanically a quite bog-standard open world game, along with the imfamous Ubisoft towers and mini challenges. But Peter's personality makes the game work, because the characters are so damn well written and the pacing helps not to overburden the player, but actually makes you feel like an overcommitted teen/tween balancing his job, his vigilante career and him helping his Aunt with the homeless shelter all while mourning his past relationship a bit. If formulaic game design helps underline great combat and writing I am entirely okay with it.

One minor gripe tho, because I am a jaded adult. I feel many of Jameson's critical points of Spider-Man and the police are - even if they are comically overexaggerated - are relevant and I hope the game does something with it. After all, a city-wide "crime radar" is the type of Orwellian nightmare one can blatantly see if their view goes an inch over the fact that this is just a thinly disguised map/tower mechanic.

And I feel Marvel needs more "small" super heroes like Spidey, Hawkeye or Captain America (with sensible writing) where a group of thugs or a mad scientist actually poses some sort of threat. Plus they can struggle and be human, if they are not so much larger than life. Hulk, Wonder Woman or Thor are just not as relatable.

[Cespenar]

So I gave Shadows of Doubt a try. The procedural crime and clue generation is pretty genius and well designed, but the stealth parts are kinda putting me off.

I'm probably not in the target audience (or haven't played enough yet), I guess, because I'm trying to play it like Obra Dinn yet I'm ending up in Minecraft fights in randos homes.

[AlanBruce]

Just finished Alan Wake 2.

Having played the first one back on release, I was looking forward to it. The wait did not disappoint. This game looks absolutely stunning. They captured the atmosphere and tone with the visuals- be it the golden hour soaked west coast canopy of Bright Falls, to the gritty neon drenched streets of NYC. In that regard, the game deserves high praise.

Gameplay wise, it is slow. It takes a few hours to build up on what it’s trying to tell. But once you get in combat (which were very few in my opinion), they are well executed. There is a detective aspect to the game, so a big bulk of the runtime is spent in a room looking at clues, which may not be for everyone.

Where they absolutely nailed it is in the story and the characters. This is perhaps the most Art House game I have played. It makes a ton of references to other media and isn’t shy about it. An incredibly surreal trip, to be sure. But likely not for everyone if you’re looking for something more fast paced.

[Psyren]

I'm a big fan of horror games with detective elements (e.g. Condemned and the first Outlast) so I'll definitely give Alan Wake 2 a try.

[AlanBruce]

I'm a big fan of horror games with detective elements (e.g. Condemned and the first Outlast) so I'll definitely give Alan Wake 2 a try.

Then this game will certainly scratch that itch. Many have said that you need to play the first game to understand this obe. Some even say you need to play other entries made by the same studio to understand the story. I disagree with that statement: Alan Wake 2 stands on its own merit.

[Errorname]

BG3 got me into a bit of a CRPG kick and after a bit of debate between whether to do a full Dragon Age or Pillars of Eternity playthrough, I've decided to boot up a new Pillars character. For all my gripes about Pillars worldbuilding I think embracing the Early Modern setting was a really good idea. It's also very funny to me that they cast the same actor as both of your earliest companions, and I respect that Mercer actually pulled off

[Whoracle]

Then this game will certainly scratch that itch. Many have said that you need to play the first game to understand this obe. Some even say you need to play other entries made by the same studio to understand the story. I disagree with that statement: Alan Wake 2 stands on its own merit.

Eh, partial disagree. If you've played no other games, you're fine, but understanding of some of the plot will come a bit later. Having played Control will just make you appreciate a few elements more and is 100% not necessary.

But if you have played Alan Wake, you'll most likely be quite confused, since Alan Wake 2 does not follow from Alan Wake, but rather from the DLC American Nightmare, and I'd argue that not having played AW is less confusing than having played AW but skipped AW:AN. Was for me, at least.

In other news:
I'm done with Alan Wake 2 now, too, and can second what AlanBruce said: Great game, give it a shot. Saga in the end still didn't really do it for me, but there's potential for her character in a sequel.
The PS5 home screen claims I'm 75% done, and I'd guess that's the missind collectibles, which I won't be collecting until the next few patches, since returning to Cauldron Lake still glitches the lighting there, and I still can't see crap. Like, there's a PC somewhere around where you'll have to input a password, and I can't make out the effin screen at all, and there's a light room in the same area where the light just is off, even though the corresponding generator is on. Only glitch I encountered, let's hope it gets resolved.

I hope we won't have to wait another 13 years for the conclusion/next title. There's still a few plot threads left dangling.

[Eldan]

So, as someone who kind of missed the original Alan Wake, but now thinks it's probably right up my alley:
Does one, these days, play the remake or the original? Are there substantial changes between the two?